SWWF: Friday, October 27th, 3:30 – 4:30 pm MDT
I would have loved the first book launch I attended after our Covid lockdown, no matter what book it presented. After all, that was my initial chance to be out, not just among people, but among my tribe, and readers. Yet I’m especially grateful that the Silver City book launch on April 29, 2022, at Silver City’s Power and Light Press, was for a book I would come to love: First & Wildest: The Gila Wilderness at 100, edited by Elizabeth Hightower Allen.
First & Wildest will once again be shared in Silver City at the 2023 Southwest Word Fiesta at our Environmental History Panel – Session B – on Friday, October 27, from 3:30-4:30 pm MDT. Venue: TBA.
JJ Amaworo Wilson, Writer in Residence at WNMU and author of award-winning Nazaré, penned “Rambling,” whose essay reminds us we are the intruders in this natural world.
JJ Amaworo Wilson, Writer in Residence at WNMU and author of award-winning Nazaré, penned “Rambling,” whose essay reminds us we are the intruders in this natural world.
Priyanka Kumar, the author of Conversations with Birds, in her essay, “Jade Mother,” shares the difference between a tame river that runs arrow straight and and a wild one, such as the one that meanders among the birds and mountain lions of the Gila’s wildness.
Sharman Apt Russell, author of Within Our Grasp, in her essay, “A Stone in Our Pocket,” shares her sense of loss after a forest fire and her wonder at the forest’s changing face.
Each contributor, with their stirring prose, transports us to this glorious land, the first declared wilderness in the US.
Hampton Sides, NYT bestselling author of Blood and Thunder, writes of First & Wildest: The Gila Wilderness at 100: “And now, as this rugged real estate approaches one hundred years of age as a preserve, here is an eloquent, lyrical, exceedingly well-timed paean — a chorus of diverse voices united in their love for this important and sometimes overlooked gem of the Southwest.”
Other contributors to First & Wildest will also appear at this year’s SWWF. Philip Connors will share the Creative Writing Workshop with Daniel Chacon (Saturday, October 28, 10-11 am MDT. Joe Saenz will join the Oral History panelists, Doug Dinwiddle, Javier Marrufo, and moderator Stephen Fox, for their session, on Saturday, October 28, from 5:30 – 6:30 pm MDT.
This event is free and open to the public. Check out the Southwest Word Fiesta website often for updates and registration: https://
